Our students, their families, and our teachers are on social media. Are our schools? Are we relying on static websites and paper newsletters as the way to disseminate information to our stakeholders?

I had the opportunity to meet with administrators recently regarding the use of social media in schools. We discussed the importance of meeting our community where they are at, the benefits of leveraging social media for specific stakeholder groups, safe practices for various platforms, automation programs for managing multiple accounts, and ways to build a personal learning network using social media. While the aforementioned subtopics proved valuable to leaders, there was a greater issue at hand. While it was not on the agenda of our session, leaders indicated that they sought guidance to combat cyberbullying and curb social media use amongst their students.

Social Media Can Be Scary

School and district leaders discussed the challenges they face in addressing social media misuse amongst the students they serve. A school site administrator remarked, “I just wish social media would disappear. It feels as if all of my day is spent dealing with cyberbullying.” I certainly understand this leader’s frustration. I have not yet met an educational leader who sought to become a school or district leader in order to dole out consequences to students all day long. A constant stream of students in an administration office, waiting to be disciplined, drains a leader’s day and causes them to focus not on the amazing things students are doing, but on the challenges. As I listened to these administrators share their concerns, I thought of two things. I asked myself:

How might we shift the narrative toward the positive?

How might we empower students themselves to make a difference in their school community?

Shift the Narrative

As the conversation continued, I moved ahead in the session slidedeck to a quote from educator and author George Couros, which reads, “We need to make the positive so LOUD that the negative becomes almost impossible to hear.” I told the true story of a national educational organization whose hashtag was taken over by porn trolls on Twitter a couple of years ago. The clickbait from the bots trolling the hashtag drowned out the few positive tweets of the morning. Within a matter of minutes, the organization sent out tweets and emails to its local leaders, asking them to share the amazing things happening in their district, school, or classroom with the inclusion of the hashtag. Sure enough, by the end of the day the trolls gave up on the hashtag and moved on. Positivity breeds positivity. How can we create an environment in our school cultures in which bullies, cyber or otherwise, give up?

Enter the Social Media Realm

It starts with us. As a school, are we modeling positive use of social media? Do we have a social media presence? And are we using it to showcase student success? I have spoken with educators that have begun social media accounts for their classes. These teachers ask their students to follow these accounts and then post positive messages, memes about academic content, images highlighting student work from the previous week.

Elementary principals use social media to create videos of themselves reading bedtime stories, or to post newscasts made by students themselves. Why is this impactful? Social media allows us to meet students outside of the school day on their personal devices. As students scroll their social media feeds, they are reminded of positive learnings from school. Social media is redefined as much more than a platform for bullying and negativity. It extends the positive influence of the school past the bell and into the hands of students via smartphones.

Students in Charge

I had the opportunity to be a guest on a podcast for students. I was asked, “How can students learn about the dangers of cyberbullying?” I answered, “They must be actively involved in the learning process. And then, they need to teach others.” There are a great many more students in our schools than there are adults. And students live in a social media world. How do we impact the student community? We give the ownership of learning and teaching over to the students themselves. Many schools leverage student leadership teams or after school clubs to guide students in managing the school social media accounts. When I was in high school, it was the yearbook and journalism classes that shared great news about student successes. In today’s world, a social media class can tell positive school stories in a digital format.

Just this week, an educator who told me the story of a middle school aged student that manages the social media accounts for his aunt’s business. Imagine the marketable skills and experience this student can now include in a college application letter, resume, job interview. As students actively learn about positive uses of social media management, they can use this learning to make an impact on their school community. Students can create public service announcements regarding the dangers of cyberbullying, organize community nights to build awareness for digital citizenship, and magnify positivity by showcasing posts that lift people up rather than tearing them down. The last thing students want is for an adult to tell them what not to do. While it is vital students learn the potential long lasting effects of nefarious social media use, this message is more impactful when they hear it through stories from like-aged peers. Let’s empower our learners themselves to build a digital community of caring, respect, and responsibility. And in the process, we adults may realize that we too can learn from those we have been called to teach.